Snowy owls feeling right at home in Worcester County

WORCESTER — Justin Lawson swings by the Worcester Regional Airport several times a week and uses a high-powered spotting scope to scan the horizon.

Cold air whips across the flat, wide-open landscape of the airport, perched more than 1,000 feet above sea level. On a Thursday morning, Mr. Lawson sees a large bird off in the distance but can't quite make out the species.

A birder and photographer, Mr. Lawson is looking for snowy owls.

Until mid-November the bird, which is the largest owl species in North America, had been seen just four times in Worcester County since 1990, according to a website that tracks sightings across the Western Hemisphere.

"The airport is the best place," he said, explaining that the birds are drawn to areas that resemble the Arctic tundra, where they nest and spend the warmer months.

On Nov. 20, Mr. Lawson's mother called while she was driving past the Kendall Reservoir in Holden in a funeral procession and noticed a large white bird.

"She said 'there's a snowy owl,'" he recalled. Not quite believing what he was hearing, Mr. Lawson made his way there and contacted his friend and fellow birder to confirm Sharon Lawson's observation.

"I'm always looking for birds," Mrs. Lawson said. "I don't usually get to spot something and actually know what it is."

Within the last month, Worcester County has doubled the number of snowy owl sightings recorded in more than two decades. That's according to eBird.org, a crowdsourcing website run by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society that compiles data about bird sightings submitted by more than 100,000 users, in order to better understand bird distribution around the world.

"It could be one of the biggest years we've had in the past 30 years," said Norman Smith, director of the Massachusetts Audubon's Blue Hills Trailside Museum, who has been studying the species since 1981.

About 200 people reported findings in Worcester County on eBird in the last year, said Marshall Iliff, a project leader for the website and chairman of the Massachusetts Avian Records Committee.

"When we look back on the data we can see the last week of November we started to see the signal for snowy owls," he said. "We're only three weeks in so there's a lot to learn over the rest of the winter."

Snowy owls are not uncommon in Massachusetts and New England. They can be seen on beaches and near the coast during the winter months before they migrate back to the Arctic in March or April, depending on the year.

Mr. Lawson, who is a bus driver for the Worcester Regional Transit Authority, has spotted 222 species of birds in Worcester County this year. He is tied for the top spot in the county and is ranked eighth in the state.

He said that he has heard of birds being seen in backyards and even in a school parking lot.

In late 2011, there was an influx of snowy owls in North America, particularly in the Great Plains region. Worcester County had one reported sighting, near the summit of Mt. Watatic.

This year, however, New England and the East Coast are getting a lot of snowy owl traffic.

Through his work with Mass. Audubon, Mr. Smith spends a lot of time capturing those that congregate at Logan International Airport in Boston and attaching transmitters before releasing them in a safer area.

The first time Mr. Smith saw a snowy owl was in Marina Bay in Quincy.

"I was just captivated by that bird," he said. "Every snowy owl I see is just as exciting as the first one."

Mr. Smith has captured 21 snowy owls at the Boston airport this year, nearly four times the number he would handle in the entire winter season. Most have been healthy, he said, and quelled a rumor that the birds are having trouble finding food.

"Given the volume of birds that come through, if they were starving they would be picked up and brought in all over the place," he said. "I'm not surprised for them to show up in the Berkshires and Worcester."

He warned people who come across the owls to keep their distance and not to disturb them.

"If you start getting close and the bird starts moving around a bit, you are too close," he said.

Mr. Smith has been in contact with people from airports across the state and said he has not been to the Worcester airport to deal with one of the birds, which pose a risk.

"If you're at an airport you want to get the bird off the runway," he said.

The Worcester airport has recorded one sighting, said airport director Andy Davis.

Through preventative strategies "we try to avoid any kind of interaction with wildlife," he said. But if an owl does pop up, he said that the strategy is to honk or drive at the bird until it flies away.

Mr. Davis, a photographer himself, said he saw a snowy owl once and spent more than an hour watching it.

On a cold, bright morning, Mr. Lawson and his friends Joe Bourget and Jess Johnson stood with their binoculars and cameras just outside of Worcester Regional Airport's chain-link fence.

The snowy owl is a "spark bird," Ms. Johnson explained. "It's something that really piques your interest" and pulls in a new flock of birders.

The group stressed that while it is exciting to see the birds, the real joy is in the chance to be outside and see things they wouldn't otherwise.

Mr. Iliff, from eBird, echoed their enthusiasm.

"It's a great opportunity," he said. "It creates a buzz for people to get out and enjoy the natural world."

Contact Alli Knothe at aknothe@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @KnotheA